Graph Theory and Universal Grammar

Tese arquivada ao abrigo da Portaria nº 227/2017 de 25 de Julho-Registo de Grau EstrangeiroIn the last few years, Noam Chomsky (1994; 1995; 2000; 2001) has gone quite far in the direction of simplifying syntax, including eliminating X-bar theory and the levels of D-structure and S-structure entirely, as well as reducing movement rules to a combination of the more primitive operations of Copy and Merge. What remain in the Minimalist Program are the operations Merge and Agree and the levels of LF (Logical Form) and PF (Phonological form). My doctoral thesis attempts to offer an economical theory of syntactic structure from a graph-theoretic point of view (cf. Diestel, 2005), with special emphases on the elimination of category and projection labels and the Inclusiveness Condition (Chomsky 1994). The major influences for the development of such a theory have been Chris Collins’ (2002) seminal paper “Eliminating labels”, John Bowers (2001) unpublished manuscript “Syntactic Relations” and the Cartographic Paradigm (see Belletti, Cinque and Rizzi’s volumes on OUP for a starting point regarding this paradigm). A syntactic structure will be regarded here as a graph consisting of the set of lexical items, the set of relations among them and nothing more

Prepositions as relators in Italian Prepositional Compounds

In this paper, we propose a morphosyntactic analysis of Prepositional Compounds in Italian. We argue that while prepositions are not meaningless, their content isn't too rich, either. We propose that they can be treated as general relators (along the lines of Manzini & Franco's (2016) treatment of locative and oblique prepositions) which can express different directions of inclusion between the nominal items which are part of the compound. The lexicalization patterns are coherent with the syncretism found in other aspects of the grammar (e.g. locative/oblique prepositions). At the same time, the specific lexicalizations of these prepositions are ultimately determined by the morphosyntactic context in which they are embedded, highlighting the key role played by the syntactic context in shaping a vocabulary entry. One advantage of our proposal lies in its minimality: the prepositions only encode general relators with varying directionalities; they are not burdened with semantic content. The relevant interpretations of Prepositional Compounds are ultimately derived by pragmatic enrichment at the C-I interface on the basis of the elementary content expressed by the preposition

Instrumental prepositions and case: Contexts of occurrence and alternations with datives.

We will argue that instrumentals are the mirror image of dative/genitive obliques. We propose that both sets of adpositions/cases are elementary predicates, expressing a zonal inclusion (part-whole/possession relation); instrumentals reverse the direction of the relation with respect to datives/genitives. Our claim is that 'with'-type morphemes provide very elementary means of attaching extra participants (themes, initiators, etc.) to events (VP or vP predicates) – with specialized interpretations derived by pragmatic enrichment (contextual, encyclopedic) at the C-I interface. We will extend our proposal to account for the observation that the instrumentals can be employed cross-linguistically in triadic verb constructions alternating with datives and we will broaden our discussion to account for dative/instrumental syncretism (eventually including DOM objects), arguing that the inclusion predicate (⊆) corresponding to ‘to’ or dative case and its reverse (⊇), corresponding to ‘with’ or instrumental case, may reduce to an even more primitive content capable of conveying inclusion in either direction. Finally, we will address ergative alignments, showing that languages may attach external arguments/agents either as possessors (⊆) or as causers (⊇) of a given event/state, yielding the two most widespread patterns of syncretism of the ergative morpheme, that is with either instrumentals or genitives/datives

A Syntactic Interpretation of the Applicative-Causative Syncretism

This paper deals with the applicative-causative syncretism, which is a pattern of morpheme polysemy attested in many different natural languages. We basically interpret the causative-applicative syncretism as based on a shared syntactic configuration. Specifically, we argue that the syncretic morpheme under investigation is the ‘applicative’ counterpart of an adpositional/case elementary relator (Manzini & Franco 2016; Franco & Manzini 2017a), attaching instrumental or benefactive obliques (High Applicatives, cf. Pylkkänen 2002, 2008) to the verbal spine. We follow Bellucci (2017), Manzini & Savoia (2018) in assuming that causees in causative constructions can be introduced as obliques, linked to the same structural position as High Appls. The causative reading of the sentence is driven by interpretive means (cf. Franco & Manzini 2017a). This readily explains the possibility of encoding causative and applicatives with the same lexical items

Oblique Serial Verbs in Creole/Pidgin Languages

This paper focuses on the syntax of (argument introducing/valency increasing) serial verbs in Creole/Pidgin languages, providing empirical arguments for the model of grammatical relations advanced in a series of recent works by Manzini and Savoia (2011a, 2011b), Manzini and Franco (2016), Franco and Manzini (2017a, 2017b), Manzini et al. (to appear a, b). These authors lay out an analysis of the syntax and interpretation of dative to, instrumental with and Differential Object Marking (DOM) relators, based on the assumption that these elements are predicates endowed with an elementary interpretive content interacting with the internal organization of the event. We assume that these oblique relators, expressing a primitive elementary part-whole/possession relation, may be instantiated also by serial (light) verbs in the grammar of natural languages. We provide a formal approach to cross-categorial variation in argument marking, trying to outline a unified morpho-syntactic template, in which so-called ‘cases’ do not configure a specialized linguistic lexicon of functional features/categories – on the contrary they help us outline an underlying ontology of natural languages, of which they pick up some of the most elementary relations. Such primitive relations can be expressed by different lexical means (e.g. case, adpositions, light verbs, etc.)

a typological rarum in sogdian overt complementizers in indicative root clauses

Abstract The purpose of this work is to illustrate an extremely rare linguistic feature, namely the overt present of a root complementizer in assertive/indicative (i.e. unmarked) matrix clauses, of the Sogdian language, an Eastern Middle Iranian Language once spoken in a region located in the valley of rivers Zaravshan and Kashkadarya (roughly corresponding to the territory of modern day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan). This linguistic fact is very interesting because it represents an overt evidence of the principle of endocentricity inferred in the Generative tradition since the early 80s. In comparative perspective, this uncommon feature of the Sogdian language may be associated to the mechanism of para-hypotaxis, previously studied in many different Romance languages (e.g. Old French, Old Italian, Old Catalan) and recently discovered in other genetically unrelated languages (e.g. Swahili, Zamucoan languages

Before strikes back:An ABA constraint on temporal expressions

In this paper, I will present a cross-linguistic analysis of the syntax of items signalling temporal distance. Based on insight from cartography and nanosyntax, I will argue that the mechanism of Phrasal Spell-out (and the Superset Principle) can elegantly explain why in many language ‘before’ and ‘ago’ meanings are expressed with the same word. I will present a previously unnoticed *ABA constraint (cf. Caha 2009; Bobaljik 2012) on lexical spans in the domain of temporal distance. The *ABA pattern will be crucial to account for possible counterexamples of Haspelmath’s (1997) fairly robust descriptive generalization,which states that forms expressing spatial relations of ‘front’ and ‘back’ regularly express anteriority and posteriority respectively, across languages when they are “shifted” from space to time (namely, before ≈ in front; after ≈ back)